Make the realism fantasy

Three Way Colour Corrector

Colour Grade is the process of altering and enhancing the colour of a motion picture, video image and it is always my favourite part of editing a video. We use colour to describe objects, express emotion, and evoke a response. It is descriptive beyond what we see. Therefore, colour grade in post production is essential. Different colour grade will generate different themes and styles of the video.

This is the screenshot of my project “The One”. We filmed the scene in a “not too sunny” day in Carlton Garden. However, this footage is a little bit too much exposure.

For the 1st grade, I reduced the brightness to -20 and contrast by -0.4. The Three-Way Colour Corrector was used to change the “mood” for the video. The Shadows, Midtones and Highlights were adjust by the following image. The Master Saturation was also changed to 45 to fade the video. Now I have a red artistic look to create a vintage theme.

For the 2nd grade, I kept using the Three-Way Colour Correction. I want to have a bold, dark and mystery look, therefore I decreased the brightness to -12, contrast by 3. I like how this function had the colour wheel for the Shadows, Midtones and Highlights. This one so far is my ideal tool in Colour Grading.

With the final grade, I decided to bring a “hope” for my character by using bright,
colourfultheme. The RGB curve is quite easy to use. When I used the red and blue together, it made the clip more liveable. I feel I needed to get a better idea of what I wanted to do with this footage, but I enjoyed giving a try on RGB curve.

Colour is a fundamental element of design and visual storytelling, and Colour Grade is an indispensable element in post-production. This is a creative process where decisions are made to further enhance or establish a new visual tone to the project.